Photo: AP Police officers stand near a van that ploughed into a crowd leaving a fireworks display in the French Riviera town of Nice.
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NY1 spoke with some French natives there. “Always on the side of the states of the world in the fight against worldwide terrorism, Turkey shares the pain of the people of France”, said Prime Minister Binali Yildirim in a Twitter message in French.
“He stopped just in front of me after he [crushed] a lot of people”.
A US official confirmed to CBS News that two Americans lost their lives.
One witness described bodies being jettisoned like bowling pins. Over 80 are reported dead, with at least one reported to be a Russian woman.
They were celebrating the French holiday in Nice Thursday night when family friends said the unthinkable happened. Authorities the truck was loaded with arms and grenades.
He was reportedly known to police for common law crimes but was not on any terror watch list.
An investigation into “murder and attempted murder in an organized group linked to a terrorist enterprise” was opened at Paris prosecutor’s office.
US President Barack Obama condemned the incident as “a horrific terrorist attack”. “Forty-eight of them are in a critical condition, of whom 25 are in intensive care”, the statement says. We’re going to have a presence, obviously, as we always do, in the well-traveled areas of the city, Times Square and other key locations. On June 23, 2015, a gunman killed 38 people, mostly British holidaymakers, on a beach in Sousse, in an attack that dealt a heavy blow to its tourism industry, which accounts for eight percent of national output. They will not succeed.
“Once again, horror has hit France”.
US presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump offered starkly different responses to the tragedy.
The attacker wanted to “harm the very idea of national unity”, he said, adding that France is having to learn to live with regular attacks.
The attack occurred on the Promenade des Anglais in Nice, France, shortly after 10:30 p.m. on July 14, 2016.
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It is also believed that three members of France’s national police chased the lorry on foot. Hollande announced Friday that the state of emergency would be extended for another three months.
